Schoolmates
by Pit Viper of Doom
Summary: For all the times Dick Grayson seemed to have a pathological need to get on her nerves, there were a few, Artemis will grudgingly admit, that she didn't mind all that much.
1. Cake

**This isn't supposed to be a single continuous story, just a collection of oneshots and vignettes. I like to think that Robin makes a game of bugging Artemis on a regular basis, just to see how much he can get away with before she starts to notice how familiar he is.**

* * *

><p>It started annoyingly enough.<p>

One moment she was stammering like an idiot to Bette, the next he was taking her picture, and the next he was gone. It all happened within the space of two blinks, barely enough time to get a good look at his face.

"Who was that?" Artemis had asked, bewildered.

"A freshman," Bette had told her, somewhat dismissively. "Ignore him." Not the most informative of answers, but Gotham was a large school full of people wearing the same clothes. Moreover, they weren't even in the same year. In all likelihood, she reasoned, they would never cross paths again.

Then it happened again the next day. Artemis was in the cafeteria during lunch, her tray balanced in her hands, looking around for a place to sit. How was she supposed to do this? Back at her old school, she'd had a small but very consistent circle of friends to sit with during lunch, during break, and during the moments in which they should have been in class but weren't. Here, she knew exactly one person that she had known since... yesterday.

"Over here, Artemis!" Bette called from a nearby table. Spotting the other sophomore, Artemis hid her relief and joined her. Oh, well. Yesterday was better than never, after all.

Artemis slid into the seat next to her potential new friend, before examining the contents of her tray. If there was one thing that she was glad of when it came to her new school, it was that the cafeteria food actually looked edible. Maybe even, dare she say it, appetizing. She was about to test this when—

"Hey, again." And there he was again, standing at her left shoulder as though he'd been there the whole time.

The archer _jumped_.

As a trained costumed hero, she prided herself on being alert, but this kid might as well have teleported to her side. She gaped at him as he gave her a prize-winning toothy smile.

"Just wanted to say welcome to Gotham Academy," he practically chirped. He glanced at her tray. "Teriyaki chicken? Good choice."

Artemis glanced down at her tray instinctively, to discover that the slice of pound cake was missing. "Hey—" she began, turning to demand its return.

The kid was gone.

Artemis turned back to Bette, who was rolling her eyes heavenward. "Did you see him—?" She broke off, scoffing in irritation. "Seriously, who is that kid?"

"He's annoying," Bette replied flatly. "Just try not to pay attention to him. Really, Artemis, he'll just keep getting on your nerves unless you ignore him."

Bette was nice enough, and Artemis liked her, but that was not the answer to her question. Moreover, Artemis was not one to simply "ignore" a random, preppy-looking kid who could ninja his way around almost as well as Robin (and _only_ almost; whatever Kaldur seemed to think, she was perfectly capable of maintaining her loyalties while attending school, thank you).

"No, really, who is he?" Artemis pressed.

"I'm surprised you don't recognize him," Bette told her. "He's Richard Grayson. Everyone calls him Dick, though." She turned back to her own lunch tray.

"Fitting," Artemis said sourly. It took her a moment to remember why she should know the name Dick Grayson. "Oh! That's... whoa." She blinked. "Seriously? Bruce Wayne's kid?" _The adopted son of the man whose charity foundation got me into this place?_ Surprise turned to annoyance. "Ugh. You mean I just let one of the richest kids in this school steal my cake?" Secretly, she was mortified. Her teammates must _never_ find out that she let some spoiled rich kid get the jump on her.

Bette glanced back at her, then past her, and blinked. "Well, not exactly..."

Artemis followed Bette's gaze, and blinked as well. The small plate of pound cake sat by her left elbow, untouched. "That... was not there when he left," was all Artemis could think to say.

Bette smiled, a little too sweetly. "I think he likes you."

"Great," Artemis muttered, returning the plate to her tray. "My second day of school and I already have a mini-stalker."

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><p>"You <em>like<em> her."

"_Whoa_," Dick protested, shifting slightly to lean away from his friend. "That is... wow. Not even close, Barbara."

"Don't try to deny it," Barbara advised casually.

"Hey, I'm allowed to tease the new kid," Dick informed her, a bit more defensively than he'd intended. "It's part of the high school experience."

"You like her," Barbara repeated, in that same matter-of-fact tone.

"I do not!" Well, truthfully, he _did_. It was hard not to like someone who'd saved his life on multiple occasions. Just... not in the way Barbara was implying.

"Yes, you do."

"You're jumping to—"

"So you're teasing her to get her attention."

"That's not what I—!"

"That's very childish, Dick."

"Barbara!"

In the end, Dick gave up. Let her think whatever she wanted. If she thought he was teasing a crush rather than trolling an oblivious superhero teammate, well, then maybe that was a good thing.

Besides, Dick thought with an inward smirk, Artemis was great and all, but Wally would kill him if he tried anything.


	2. Notes

He was in her history class.

Good God, it was like the universe was conspiring against her.

It wasn't until the third day of school that she found out, thanks to a mistake in her schedule that landed her in African American Studies for an embarrassing first two days. The error had been corrected with unexpected swiftness, at least to Artemis's standards. Back at Gotham North, it usually took a week for the guidance counselors to schedule an appointment, much less get around to clearing up schedule mishaps. It did make sense, she reasoned; Gotham Academy was an expensive school, so they were probably better about fixing little errors like that. Still, by Friday she was still overhearing a few of her classmates bemoaning their own agenda problems. So she supposed she was lucky.

Or... not. Since the quick schedule change meant she had that much more time sitting in front and to the right of Richard John Grayson, in full view of his near-constant smile whenever she turned to look at the clock, maybe African American Studies wouldn't have been so bad.

It wasn't that much of a drag; Bette sat in front of her, and to her left was another prospective new friend, a redheaded freshman who had introduced herself before class as Barbara Gordon. Artemis remembered seeing something on TV some time ago about a James Gordon being made police commissioner, and wondered if that was a coincidence.

Considering the adoptive son of the richest man in Gotham was currently doodling circus animals in his notebook at the desk diagonally behind her, she doubted it. If she hadn't felt out of place in this school before, she was definitely feeling it now.

Well, she told herself stubbornly, if Artemis the daughter of criminals could find her place in the Justice League's black ops team, then Artemis the lower-working-class scholarship student could find her place here. It was the same basic principle, wasn't it? She could just stumble along and gripe until she found her footing. The only difference was that the uniform was more restricting, and a swift punch to the shoulder wasn't the best way to solve minor problems. Though, that part was fine with her, seeing as Wally didn't go to this school.

At one point, when Mr. Saler's back was turned, Barbara surreptitiously passed a slip of paper to Artemis, who palmed it when the teacher turned their way again. Well-versed in the consequences of note-passing during class (that, at least, had to be the same here as in Gotham North), Artemis patiently waited until he was looking elsewhere again before reading it.

_Sorry about Dick. He hasn't stolen anything important, has he?_

Artemis quickly scrawled her own note under Barbara's before passing it back. _No. Why?_

The slip of paper went back and forth, each time with a new message scribbled beneath the previous one.

_He's my friend, and he's kind of crazy. Someone has to keep an eye on him._

_If you're the reason he gave me my cake back yesterday, then you're doing an admirable job._

_No, he just did that for fun, he told me. I don't know what's wrong with him._

Artemis shot a brief glance to the object of their written conversation, who returned it with another cheesy grin. Irked, she wrote a quick, somewhat sarcastic reply and passed it back to Barbara. _That's probably what his mother said when he was born._

From the way Barbara made no move to pass back a reply, coupled with the funny look the redhead gave her, Artemis sensed she'd said something wrong. Barbara's expression wasn't angry, per se; if anything, she seemed to be on the verge of cringing. It was the sort of look a third party gave you when they saw you tell a lawyer joke to someone who turned out to be a lawyer.

Artemis blinked and looked to the front of the class, feeling uncomfortable. It had been a meaningless dig at the kid, nothing harmful. So why was—?

Oh, right. Adopted. Parents were probably dead. Nice going, Artemis, you just flubbed a first impression with a perfectly nice girl in a school where you have no friends.

In spite of herself, she winced inwardly.

The class wore on. The effects of industrialization on middle-class America had never held much of an interest for Artemis, but she endeavored to pay attention anyway, now that the note-passing was no longer occupying her attention. She may as well earn that scholarship, as long as she was here. Besides, it wasn't like there was much else to do, other than daydream or wonder what the team was doing. Megan, Conner, and Wally were in school, she knew, and Kaldur might be back in Atlantis, or doing another favor for Red Arrow. The archer did wonder about Robin, though. He was thirteen, so he was probably in school, but then again, she rarely (if ever) heard of him doing anything that didn't involve the team or Batman. What did a kid like that do during the day?

Whatever it was, Artemis briefly wished she could swap places with him. Anything was better than sitting in a classroom, listening to Mr. Saler drone on about the shift to steel and steam power.

Mercifully, the bell rang, and it was all Artemis could do to keep from dashing out of the classroom. As it was, she was in a bit of a rush to shoulder her backpack and leave, and was among the first to reach the door. Despite this, Barbara caught up to her in the hallway.

"Hey, sorry about that, wasn't thinking," Artemis said lamely.

"No, it's okay," Barbara assured her hurriedly. "It's just, Dick was sitting right behind me, so he might have seen it."

"Crap."

"I thought it'd be better to quit while we were ahead," Barbara went on, a bit awkwardly. "It's just something he never talks about." A bit abruptly, as though anxious to change the subject, she went on, "So what class do you have next?"

"Why do you want to know?" Artemis asked.

Barbara shrugged, smiling disarmingly. "Just trying to be friendly. You seem like a pretty cool person."

Artemis raised an eyebrow. "Your friend didn't put you up to this, did he?" she asked half-jokingly.

"Heh, no, but I'm a little curious about why he's so interested in you."

"Trust me, I'm just as confused as you are," Artemis told her dryly. "Anyway, I have algebra next, so I have to stop by my locker for my textbook" She grimaced slightly. "I hate math."

"Really? How come?"

"I dunno, I just find it boring," Artemis replied with a shrug. "It's not that I'm bad at it, I just don't like to do it, that's all. Really, I'm more into my extracurriculars than actual school, bu—oh, what the fresh hell is this?" Reaching her locker, Artemis spotted a yellow sticky note on the door and took it down. Scrawled on it was a doodle of what looked like a daisy, followed by a question mark.

Artemis stared at it, nonplussed. "I feel like there's some sort of inside joke that I'm missing."

Barbara crossed her arms and shrugged. "Don't look at me. Though, if he's still bugging you, that probably means he _didn't_ take offense after all."

With a sigh, Artemis crumpled the slip of paper and tossed it into the nearest trash can. "Suddenly I can't wait to get to algebra. I'll see you later, Barbara."

It seemed she wasn't getting rid of her mini-stalker so easily.

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><p><strong>I would explain the awful, awful pun, but the Joker doesn't like that.<strong>


End file.
